The Church Season of Easter,
Easter 2 - Quasimodogeniti
Our Savior Lutheran Church, Midland, MI (April 15, 2012)
Readings: Psalm 33
Ezekiel
37:1-14
1
John 5:4-10
John
20:19-31
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In
the Name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit
John 20:19-31 (ESV)
19 On the evening of that day, the first day of the week,
the doors being locked where the disciples were for fear of the Jews, Jesus
came and stood among them and said to them, “Peace be
with you.” 20 When he had said this, he showed them his hands and his
side. Then the disciples were glad when they saw the Lord. 21 Jesus said to them again,
“Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, even so
I am sending you.” 22 And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said
to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. 23
If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you withhold
forgiveness from any, it is withheld.” 24 Now Thomas, one of the
Twelve, called the Twin, was not with them when Jesus came. 25 So the other disciples told him, “We have seen the Lord.” But he said to them,
“Unless I see in his hands the mark of the nails, and place my finger into the
mark of the nails, and place my hand into his side, I will never believe.” 26
Eight
days later, his disciples were inside again, and Thomas was with them. Although
the doors were locked, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.” 27 Then he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here, and see my hands; and put out your
hand, and place it in my side. Do not disbelieve, but believe.” 28
Thomas
answered him, “My Lord and my God!”
29 Jesus said to him, “Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are
those who have not seen and yet have believed.” 30 Now Jesus did many other
signs in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book; 31
but
these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of
God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.
Alleluia! Alleluia! Christ is risen!
He is risen indeed! Alleluia! Amen.
We can be so happy that
Jesus promised that all who believe in Him will live with Him forever. Our short lives here on this earth are simply
not long enough to consider the wonderful things that our God has done for
us. Each event in the life of Jesus Christ
gives us more and more to contemplate.
Meditation on the Son of God taking on human flesh at Christmas could
last a lifetime. The Lord’s Prayer has
enough in it to keep us to the end of our days.
There is a lifetime of study in each of the seven words from the cross
as shared from the Gospel accounts. No
matter how often we open the pages of Holy Scripture, it has new things to
teach us. How marvelous it will be to
think on the things of God as we live in the presence of Christ for an
eternity.
The resurrection is certainly
one of those events that has a lifetime of teaching in it. So it is that we continue to contemplate the
events of that first Easter day on this Second Sunday of Easter.
Today’s Gospel gives us an
account of two appearances of Jesus to His disciples. It is the familiar account that we read every
year on the Second Sunday of Easter. The
first time Jesus appeared, Thomas was not in church. The second time, he was. However, there is a lot more going on in this
Gospel account than just Thomas.
It is helpful to remember
that all of the disciples were total pagans on that weekend. Yes, I said pagans. Remember, Jesus had promised that He would
rise from the dead, but none of the disciples believed Him. When Jesus died on the cross, His disciples
thought they would never see Him again – at least not until the general
resurrection from the dead on the Last Day, whenever that was. For a few days on that weekend, all of the
disciples were unbelievers.
This is a great comfort to
us. Each and every one of us has those
days when we don’t feel very Christian.
Each and every one has those days when we wonder why we keep on trying. Our life is full of doubts. While life seems to be coming up roses for
others, it seems to be coming up stink cabbage for us.
When we have days like
that, we can look to the gentle way in which Jesus showed Himself to His
disciples. Note that Jesus did not wait
for the disciples to look for Him, but He went after them – even through locked
doors. What a blessing they received
when the Lord greeted them with such kindness, “Peace be with you.” Jesus
appeared to His pagan disciples and gave them His peace. He did not punish. He did not reject nor rebuke. He did not scold. He gave them His peace.
He gave them every proof
that He had kept His promise, just like He said He would, that He had risen
from the dead. He showed them the scars
of the crucifixion and the spear. With
these signs they saw that this was indeed their friend and master who had died
on the cross but was now alive again. In
this kind and gentle way, He restored their hope and renewed their faith.
Here we see the friendly
heart of Jesus as He comes to bring comfort to all who are troubled or
frightened. He comforted and
strengthened His disciples so that our Gospel states that “the disciples were glad when they saw the Lord.” Jesus is always with us all who are needy and
anxious. He comes to us to bring us the
comfort of the forgiveness of sins, life, and salvation.
After Jesus comforted and
assured His disciples that He was indeed alive, He did something incredible. He ordained these doubting disciples as His
Apostles. Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent
me, even so I am sending you.” A
disciple and an apostle are not the same thing.
A disciple is a student who follows the teachings of a particular
teacher. An apostle is one who is sent
out. Every apostle must be a disciple,
but Jesus did not send every disciple as an apostle. When Jesus told these disciples that He was
sending them, they became His apostles.
Jesus told His disciples
that they were His apostles just as He Himself was an apostle of God the
Father. He said, “As the Father has sent me, even so I am sending you.” The Father sent Jesus. So Jesus is the apostle of the Father. In the same way, Jesus sent His apostles to
bring the message of salvation to the world.
When we hear the words of the apostles, we are hearing the words of
Jesus, and when we hear the words of Jesus, we are hearing the words of the
Father. It is a truly great and glorious
thing for preachers of the Word to have this treasure that Jesus gave to the
apostles.
As great and glorious as
these gifts are, Jesus gave even more gifts to His apostles. He gave them the authority to forgive and
retain sins. “[Jesus] breathed on them and said to them, “Receive
the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins
of any, they are forgiven them; if you withhold forgiveness from any, it is
withheld.” Just as God breathed the
breath of life into Adam so that he became a living soul, so also Jesus
breathed the Holy Spirit into His apostles.
The Holy Spirit would work through these apostles to deliver the
forgiveness of sins that Jesus earned for us on the cross. The Holy Spirit would also work through these
apostles to withhold forgiveness from those people who refuse to repent.
It is an amazing thing that
the mouth of every preacher can be Christ’s mouth. When a pastor forgives your sins in the Name
of Jesus, he is placing the very forgiveness of Jesus Christ on you. He is not giving you his forgiveness, but the
Holy Spirit works through the pastor to deliver the true forgiveness of Jesus
Christ to you. As I often say: “it is
worth it to come to the Lord’s Divine Service even if all you hear is Christ’s
words from the pastor’s mouth as he says, “I forgive you all your sins, in the Name
of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.” With these words, the pastor really does give
Christ’s forgiveness to you. With these
words Jesus promises to bring heaven itself into your presence.
It is very likely that if
you asked the average person on the street if they wanted to go to heaven, they
would say yes. How sad it is that so
many people don’t know that Jesus Himself promises to give us the very gifts of
heaven in His Divine Service to us. How very
sad it is that Christ has placed the very gift of forgiveness in the mouths of
faithful pastors and so many people simply walk right by and pay no more
attention to them than they would to a mooing cow. How very sad it is that so many people do not
know about the precious gifts of heaven that faithful pastors deeply yearn to
give to them.
Today’s Gospel gives us an
account of the great gifts that Jesus desires for us. He patiently ignored the doubting hearts of
all the disciples in order to show them His risen body. Then He sent those disciples to be apostles
so that the church down through the ages would have the very word of God
through the mouths and pens of those apostles.
He puts His own forgiveness – the very forgiveness that He earned with
His life’s blood on the tree of the cross – He puts that forgiveness into the
mouths of the faithful pastors of His church.
In all these ways, He sends the Holy Spirit to establish and strengthen
our faith – the very faith that believes in Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of
sins and receives all the gifts that Christ gives to us.
Today’s account from the
Gospel shows us how gracious Jesus is – not only with Thomas, but with all of
the disciples. Even though the disciples
denied and abandoned Jesus – even though they believed He was dead and gone –
even though they continued to sin daily, Jesus did not reject them. Instead, He made them part of His plan to
proclaim the Gospel to the world.
From this Gospel account we
learn that Jesus does not deal with us as we deserve, but He is gracious. He seeks us out as sheep who have gone
astray. In spite of our many failings
and sins, He continues to supply us with His loving and gracious
forgiveness. In spite of our many
failings, He has chosen to make us His forever.
Amen
Alleluia! Alleluia! Christ is risen!
He is risen indeed! Alleluia! Amen.
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